Abstract. To study the biochemistry of ribonucleoprotein export from the nucleus, we characterized an in vivo assay in which the cytoplasmic appearance of radiolabeled ribosomal subunits was monitored after their microinjection into Xenopus oocyte nuclei. Denaturing gel electrophoresis and sucrose density gradient sedimentation demonstrated that injected subunits were transported intact. Consistent with the usual subcellular distribution of ribosomes, transport was unidirectional, as subunits injected into the cytoplasm did not enter the nucleus. Transport displayed properties characteristic of a facilitated, energy-dependent process; the rate of export was saturable and transport was completely inhibited either by lowering the temperature or by depleting nuclei of ATP; the effect of lowered temperature was completely reversible. Transport of injected subunits was likely a process associated with the nuclear pore complex, since export was also inhibited by prior or simultaneous injection of wheat germ agglutinin, a lectin known to inhibit active nuclear transport by binding to N-acetyl glucosamine-containing glycoproteins present in the NPC (Hart, G. W., R. S. Haltiwanger, G. D. Holt, and W. G. Kelly. 1989. Annu. Rev. Biochem. 58:841-874). Although GIcNAc modified proteins exist on both the nuclear and cytoplasmic sides of the nuclear pore complex, ribosomal subunit export was inhibited only when wheat germ agglutinin was injected into the nucleus. Finally, we found that ribosomal subunits from yeast and Escherichia coli were efficiently exported from Xenopus oocyte nuclei, suggesting that export of some RNP complexes may be directed by a collective biochemical property rather than by specific macromolecular primary sequences or structures.T HE assembly of ribosomes in eukaryotic cells is a process that requires transfer of macromolecules into and out of the nucleus (33). Ribosomal proteins, synthesized in the cytoplasm, enter the nucleus and assemble with nascent rRNA to form a preribosomal particle. Through a series of maturation steps involving endonucleolytic cleavage of the primary rRNA transcript and further addition of specific ribosomal proteins, the preribosomal particle splits into partially completed 40S and 60S subunits that contain the nearly mature 18S and 28S:5.8S rRNAs, respectively. The pre-60S subunit also acquires a 5S rRNA molecule by addition of a separate 5S-containing RNP (51). Eventually, the 40S and 60S subunits exit the nucleus into the cytoplasm where they assemble with additional ribosomal proteins. While much is known about mechanisms that regulate synthesis of individual ribosomal components (4, 56), we envision equally important mechanisms that promote efficient assembly of ribosomal components. Therefore, we wish to determine the driving forces that bring about exchange of ribosomal components between the nucleus and cytoplasm.Mechanisms of macromolecular transport across the nuclear-cytoplasmic boundary have been the focus of much recent research. A conspicuous structure spanning...

Three unlinked genes, TDH1, TDH2 and TDH3, encode the glycolytic enzyme glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase (triose-phosphate dehydrogenase; TDH) in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. We demonstrate that the synthesis of the three encoded TDH polypeptides (TDHa, TDHb and TDHc, respectively) is not co-ordinately regulated and that TDHa is only synthesised as cells enter stationary phase, due to glucose starvation, or in heat-shocked cells. Furthermore, the synthesis of TDHb, but not TDHc, is strongly repressed by a heat shock. Hence, the TDHa enzyme may play a cellular role, distinct from glycolysis, that is required by stressed cells.

The protein pattern of yeast cells which have arrested proliferation in response to glucose exhaustion is drastically different from that of exponentially growing cells (Boucherie, 1985). In this study, we used two-dimensional gel electrophoresis to characterize the protein events responsible for these alterations. We found that the induction of heat-shock proteins is one of the major events responsible for these changes. This induction accounts for the synthesis of 18 of the 35 novel polypeptides observed in glucose-limited cells. It was shown to occur in combination with two other protein events: the derepression of carbon catabolite repressed proteins, which accounts for the synthesis of the other novel polypeptides, and an arrest of the synthesis of almost all the proteins present in exponentially growing cells. The time course of each of these events was determined by carrying out a detailed analysis of the pattern of proteins synthesized at various stages of a culture exhausting its glucose supply, and by the measurement of the rate of synthesis of individual polypeptides. The results showed in particular that the synthesis of most of the heat-shock proteins synthesized in glucose-limited cells was induced closely before glucose exhaustion, and that this synthesis was transient, climaxing by the time glucose was exhausted. Under the culture condition investigated, the entry into stationary phase associated with glucose limitation began several hours before glucose exhaustion. It was thus concluded that the observed induction of heat-shock proteins is directly related to the nutritional limitation and is independent from the arrest of cell proliferation.

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